


The Five Stages of Grief

by ElevateLevitate



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Acceptance, Anger, Bargaining, Character Death, Denial, Depression, Destiel Angst, Five Stages of Grief, Loss of loved one, M/M, Non-Canonical Character Death, Sad sad sad, cas loses himself, dean is dead and cas doesnt know what to do, dean is the mcd, i dont know how i feel about this, they were together before he died, trigger warning for suicide contemplation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:53:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25653169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElevateLevitate/pseuds/ElevateLevitate
Summary: dean dies and castiel goes through it.content warnings for death, contemplation of suicide and depression.happy reading :)
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 6
Kudos: 28





	The Five Stages of Grief

_Denial._

Castiel wills himself like never before to awaken from the terrible, soul-destroying nightmare.

_I thought dreams were supposed to be good._

Everything will be okay. Castiel kneels to the ground, blood painted across his face and clothes like paint. His hands are raw and bloody, trembling, and hesitant as they drift to grasp the lapels of Dean’s jacket, lightly pulling at the garment. He shakes Dean once, twice, three times, with no response.

“Dean? Dean, wake up.”

His voice comes out hoarse and unfamiliar, as if it belongs to someone else entirely, someone who has lost hope.

“Dean, please, it’s me, Castiel. I need you to wake up now. Everything will be okay; you just need to wake up.”

Castiel grows frantic and starts shaking Dean more intensely. A tiny trickle of crimson blood makes its way out of the corner of Dean’s mouth, slipping down and away beneath his jawline and across his collar bone.

Castiel’s gaze follows the drop of blood as it makes its way across the harsh terrain of Dean’s bruise mottled skin. He remembers when there used to be bruises there for an entirely different reason; when he was the one to travel across the valley of Dean’s neck with his lips, leaving marks of adoration.

Castiel’s gaze clouds with tears that sting his nose and disturb his vision, and he grabs Dean’s shoulders, lifting him into a sitting position and gathering his rag-doll-like form into his lap, squeezing Dean’s head into his chest.

“It’s okay Dean, you- you can wake up, it’s all okay, there’s no danger anymore! You can come back to me… P-please Dean, please, _please,_ Dean. I can’t do this without you. I _won’t_ do this without you. It’s okay. You’re gonna be okay. I’ll fix this I promise.”

Castiel cannot bear to hear the sound of his own voice any longer, not when there is nothing to accompany it but stiff, stark silence.

He starts to press tender yet desperate kisses to Dean’s forehead, into his soft hair, the corner of his mouth, his closed eyelids, his hands, his cheeks, everywhere Castiel can get to.

Castiel detaches from the passing of time that night, he just sits on the ground, his knees digging into the dirt, his shoes creasing, and his trench coat wrapped around Dean to keep him safe, warm. He still hasn’t woken up.

Hours have passed but to Castiel they feel longer than all the aeons he has been roaming this universe. Minutes feel like years without Dean.

“Dean,” Castiel’s voice breaks the harsh silence with a coarse whisper, his vocal cords strained from his crying and begging. “Please, just wake up. We need you. Sam needs you. I-,” He can’t seem to dislodge the words from the back of his throat where they are so stubbornly stuck in defiance, _denial._

_I need you._

_

_Anger._

“You should have been there, Sam! You failed him, you’re his _brother_ and you weren’t there!” Castiel spat the words out like fire, and Sam cringes at each syllable like he can feel the heat emanating from Castiel’s intent.

“Cas I-,” Sam starts to try and reason with Castiel, but words fail him. His eyes are rimmed red and puffy purple bags hang beneath them sullenly. Sam raises his eyes to meet the angel’s, pathetically, pleadingly. “There was nothing I could’ve done, there was nothing _you_ could’ve-”

Castiel interrupts him abruptly, his voice breaking out into loud, thrashing gasps. “I don’t care! Your brother was _dying,_ and you didn’t even answer your phone.” Castiel narrows his eyes at Sam and turns his mouth downwards into a sneer. “What kind of brother are you?”

Sam’s face falls even further than it already had, his eyes filling with fresh tears and the hurt flashing across his face like a flare.

“Cas… don’t- don’t say that, you know I would’ve died in Dean’s place if I- if I could’ve…” Sam trails off and beseeches Castiel with his eyes to believe him, to understand that he’s in pain, to comfort him.

However, Sam’s words only inflame Castiel further. The usual deep blue of the angel’s eyes is replaced by a metallic blue, like lightning illuminating the open sea, his _anger_ radiating off his body almost visibly.

“HE SHOULD BE ALIVE RIGHT NOW!” Castiel’s screams bounce of the walls of the bunker and books start to fly off shelves and furniture starts to fling itself towards the youngest, and now only, Winchester.

Sam ducks out of the way of most of the books and chairs that come his way, but a few novels clip his shoulders and head.

“Cas stop it! Cas, please! Please, just calm down!” Sam cries out to his friend in a desperate attempt to pacify him.

“Calm down?! Dean is dead! How am I supposed to just calm down?!” The remaining books drop out of mid-air and hit the floor with heavy thuds, but Castiel is far from calm. He gesticulates wildly and his eyes are still flashing electric blue.

“Dean is dead and I’m still here - how am I supposed to carry on?! DEAN IS DEAD! HE’S DEAD AND I COULDN’T SAVE HIM!” Huge, hot tears start to fall down Castiel face, leaping out of his eyes like a lost man off a bridge. Castiel collapses to the floor and screams to whoever is listening to _bring him back_ and _take me instead_.

Sam shakes himself out of his frozen stance and rushes towards a crumpled, shaking, hysterical excuse for the once-untouchable angel he used to know.

Sam kneels next to Castiel and slowly wraps his arms around the sobbing seraphim. Castiel fights back at first, blabbering indistinctly for Sam to _get away from me_ and _leave me be._ Eventually all his strength leaves him and Castiel sinks into Sam’s embrace, burying his head into Sam’s arm and allowing his vessel to be taken over with huge, wracking sobs that almost shake the earth.

“He’s gone. He’s gone. He’s gone.” Castiel whispers brokenly into Sam’s chest.

Sam lets his walls down too and unrestricted tears spill down his face, accompanied by sobs and gasps.

They stay like that for many minutes, neither of them wanting to get up and face a world without the man they both loved above all, albeit in different ways.

Only then does it occur to Sam that angels do not cry.

-

_Bargaining._

Castiel slides a hand into the pocket of his trench coat to check for the presence of the matchbox. He pulls it out and kneels in the centre of the crossroads. He extricates a small spade from his other pocket and begins to disturb the dirt road.

As soon as the hole is big enough, Castiel pushes the matchbox into it and repositions the dirt above it with his hands. They shake as he sweeps over the ground.

He gets to his feet and waits. Seconds that pass in slow motion fill the silence.

“An angel bargaining with a demon? That sounds like the start of a joke.” A low baritone sounds out from behind Castiel, causing him to turn to the speaker.

Castiel ignores the demon’s attempt at taunting and instead states his intention. “I’m here to make a deal. My life for someone else’s.”

Castiel can feel his heart thumping in his chest like a hammer. _This has to work. This_ will _work._

The demon’s eyes flash black and a wicked grin spreads across his face. “And who might this ‘someone else’ be?”

Castiel takes in a breath. He finds it hard to pull the name from his lips. “Dean.” A pause. “Dean Winchester.”

The demon’s smile spreads even further, morphing his face into something derisive and mocking. “A _Winchester_? I didn’t hear about that…. he must be upstairs, then.”

Castiel steels himself against attacking the demon. Through gritted teeth he says, “Can you help me, or not?”

The demon drops his smile and replaces it with an expression of nonchalance. “Sorry angel, he’s not in Hell, so there’s nothing I can do about it.”

_Goddamn it._

Castiel says nothing but simply meets the demon’s eyes with a celestial flash of his own and with three quick steps and a hand inside his coat, Castiel’s blade connects with the demon’s heart, lighting the demon up in orange splutters before he drops to the ground, lifeless.

The angel steps over the body lying at his feet and bends to retrieve his match box.

His hands shake.

“Naomi, I need your help. I need you to bring him back. _Please._ ” With his face tilted to the sky and his hands clasped in prayer, Castiel resorts to _bargaining_ with the one angel he swore he would never ask anything of.

He stands there for a long time, imploring the heavens to return to him the love of his long, long life.

Castiel does not know how much time had passed when he hears the familiar flutter of wings, the sound of it makes him ache in longing for his own beautiful feathers which were stolen from him so long ago.

“Castiel.” Naomi nods her head in greeting.

“Naomi, I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye, but I need you to do this for me.” Castiel pleads with his eyes, with the movement of his lips, with every atom of his being.

Naomi drops her gaze to the ground and shakes her head. “I am sorry, Castiel. I simply cannot break the rules for you again.” To her credit, she sounded ever so slightly remorseful, but that wasn’t enough for Castiel.

“You owe me this!” Castiel grows desperate, tries to guilt the other angel into helping him. “After everything you did to me, _you owe me this._ ” He drops his voice low at the end of statement, quietly beseeching.

Naomi lifts her eyes to meet Castiel’s with a look on her face; maybe sorrow but maybe something else entirely.

“I’m sorry, Castiel.” She says again, and once again comes the flap of wings and she is gone, leaving Castiel to his own broken devices.

Castiel stumbles back at the rush of air following Naomi’s departure.

“No.” He whispers. “No, no, NO!” Again, and again, increasing in volume and becoming more frantic each time he repeats the exclamation.

And once again, the land is filled with the screams and cries of a desperate angel, so deep into his anguish and aching that he does not notice the sun as it rises.

-

_Depression._

If Castiel was a human, he would have wasted away weeks ago.

Ever since the night he tried to bargain for Dean, once he had summoned the strength to crawl pitifully back to the bunker, he had been in the same place; sitting on Dean’s bed, his trench coat halfway off his shoulders and the comforter bunched up in his hands.

If looks could destroy, the wall in front of Castiel would be a pile of rubble.

Sam had tried on numerous occasions to coax the angel out his dead boyfriend’s room, but to no avail.

It is Monday, and Castiel seems not to be able to hear anything around him, all his remaining energy being poured out on staring at the wall opposite the bed and occasionally taking deep breaths of the comforter which still smells like Dean.

It smells like Old Spice and coffee and late-night kisses and whispered confessions of love.

It smells like a home that Castiel can never return to, no matter how much he wants to.

He misses Dean so much that it feels as if all the atoms of his being are being pulled apart in slow, agonising strokes.

It is Tuesday and Castiel tears his gaze away from the wall and casts it onto the hoary angel blade lying next to him, still covered in now dry demon blood.

He contemplates ending his pain and exchanging it for an endless slumber in the Empty. After all, eternal nothing is better than the nothing he feels without Dean.

He wants to stop feeling.

He doesn’t know how to exist in a universe without Dean.

He doesn’t ~~know~~ want to move on.

It is Wednesday and Castiel destroys his angel blade.

It is Thursday and Castiel leaves Dean’s room, placing the comforter back on the bed and switching off the light before closing the door.

-

_Acceptance._

It has been a year since Dean’s death and Castiel is unrecognisable.

He hasn’t spoken to Sam in months.

He has hardened in many, irreversible ways.

He has rules now.

  1. Stay detached, emotional attachment is a liability.
  2. Focus on the mission, do not stray.
  3. Friends are a risk, stay alone.
  4. Family is dangerous, push them away for your protection and theirs.



Castiel roams the country, hunting monsters and ending them. Night and day, he searches for the demon that killed _him_. It is not love that drives him, or even revenge. It is something darker, something twisted and contorted, buried deep inside him where a full, happy heart used to lie.

A couple of months ago in late July, when the air tasted of nectar and the wind was sleeping, Castiel was joined by another hunter while tracking a vampire nest in New Orleans.

The hunter, Taylor, was a young woman, maybe 25, and was raised a hunter. She bumped into Castiel on the road to Louisiana when she saved him from a Wendigo.

When she had asked him where he was headed next, he concluded that I wouldn’t hurt to have an extra pair of hands, so they piled into Castiel’s 1078 Lincoln Continental Mark V and set off on the road to New Orleans.

A day later and the two of them were in the thick of a bloody fight with the vampire nest. Castiel’s intelligence told him it would be twenty, maybe thirty, vampires strong but it was nearly double that and he and Taylor found themselves being overrun.

Castiel sliced the head off of one vampire and twisted the head of another. He looked over at Taylor and saw her struggling to keep the bloodsuckers at bay.

He knew what he had to do.

 _You can’t go around sacrificing innocents, it’s not what_ he _would do._

Castiel decapitated two more vampires in an attempt to silence his inner monologue. He was running out of time and needed to act quickly if he wanted his plan to work.

_Rule number two; focus on the mission, do not stray._

He glanced over once more at Taylor but couldn’t find it in him to care enough to warn her.

Castiel dropped his blade and squeezed his eyes shut.

He opened them again.

Light streamed from his eyes, his mouth, his palms.

The vampires were burned away by Castiel’s grace.

Castiel walked over to s crumpled form on the ground.

He bent down and picked up Taylor’s blade, wiped it on his jacket and left.

 _You’ve become a monster. What would_ he _think?_

Castiel paused briefly to consider this but found that he no longer cared about the moral compass of a man long dead.

It has been a year since Dean’s death and Castiel is indifferent to the events of the last 11 years of his life.

He has _accepted_ that there is nothing he can do, and the angel has chosen to return to what he was created for, all those aeons ago.

Destroying evil, no matter the cost.

**Author's Note:**

> so......this was sad......ciao anyway soooo. kudos and comments are apreciated :)


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